


Gratitude

by outcharm



Category: Gorillaz
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Declarations Of Love, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Fighting, Fluff, Gen, Humor, Humour, Hurt/Comfort, Kissing, Murdoc Niccals - Freeform, Phase Four (Gorillaz), Phase Six (Gorillaz), gender neutral reader, it could be either or of those lol, murdoc can have a little bit of feelings. as a treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-31
Updated: 2020-01-31
Packaged: 2021-02-25 15:26:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22498303
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/outcharm/pseuds/outcharm
Summary: Murdoc is a mosquito bite for your emotional state sometimes. He sets his roots and builds a brick house under your skin, residing there, draining you of livelihood until you’re devoid in everything but irritation. He’s the type of itch that is unreachable on your body, and likes to taunt you when you finally manage to scratch it. But just like the best mosquito bites, there’s something very therapeutic about it. It’s almost primal, the way it feels good deep down.
Relationships: Murdoc Niccals/Reader
Comments: 15
Kudos: 114





	Gratitude

Saturday night with no one to spend it with is boring, and at its worst, incredibly depressing.

You feel your tired and worn hands scrunch the weighted blanket covering you like 2 layers of dried paint. It’s drowning you in its softness. It practically begs like a dog, pleading you to ease into its arms. Or maybe it’s the other way around, you’d rather drift off of consciousness like a snowflake to the ground.

It’s late. You don’t know how late, but the sitcom from the 90s tells you more about the time than your phone could ever attempt to. Your ears, focused on eliminating any sound that takes away the euphoria of sleep grudgingly hears forced laughter from an audience.

You sound rather pessimistic, and it’s completely nauseating to hear your own thoughts like this.

Truth be told, days have become a tornado of depression and melancholic resentment ever since the indescribable rough patch you had dragged yourself into with Murdoc.

You don’t even remember what the fight was about. Just anger boiling in the steam pot of your relationship, bubbling like lava, pops of snide comments released at each other until the heat was just became too much. Stress had been eating away at both of you like how a caterpillar munches on a leaf, slowly, but ultimately exiting with gaping, jagged holes.

You remember the striking slam of the door, opening and closing with the sound of lightning. Were those his calloused hands? Or were they your trembling ones?

You remember the tears sticking to your face like hot glue. They stained your cheeks, your chin, oozing down your neck until you felt nothing but fire in your body. You remember yelling to the point where your ears begged for mercy, the type of yelling where a child becomes an adult.

Oh, _yeah_. Now your head seems to remember. It sounds the alarm of that memory you had much rather repress deep into the cobwebbed corners of your mind.

You were exhausted of Murdoc putting on a performance, wherever he was, or whoever he was with. The mask be wears had been permanently glued onto his face since his adolescence, adolescence which had been coated with alcoholism and sticky rage. No communication between a couple is its ultimate destruction after all, you had thought when the tree branch inside you snapped several days ago.

“Why can’t you just open up to me-“

“And why do you have the inability to fucking let it go?” The words shot out of Murdoc’s mouth like venom from a snake ready to kill. His hands clenched, and you could almost picture his claws digging into your own skin as you saw his palms turn into a combination of pink and white.

You feel like you’re swallowing a boulder, as it floats down your throat and into your stomach before you had to respond. You couldn’t keep putting this off, you hate how he had to lie about how he felt, and when you had slipped between the cracks in his iron wall, all you could see was a pool of rage and icy depression.

“Stop pushing me away! You’re not doing anything besides making yourself miserable!”

“Do NOT push this away from yourself. You always have to know every little thing, control every minute aspect of something you just couldn’t POSSIBLY understand. I’m not making myself miserable, I make you miserable. And sometimes, I fucking enjoy watching you be upset.”

There’s nothing more infuriating than knowing that he’s right, and nothing more frustrating when the anger he evokes deep inside you conquers the logical side of you as enemies would do in war. Less physically bloody, but it stings just as much.

It may be his coy arched eyebrow, his shoulders always held up laughably high, his cocky smirk that’s always prepared for a fight, any of those that ignites a resentful bomb swelling within your chest. But it’s almost always his talent for words.

Murdoc is a mosquito bite for your emotional state sometimes. He sets his roots and builds a brick house under your skin, residing there, draining you of livelihood until you’re devoid in everything but irritation. He’s the type of itch that is unreachable on your body, and likes to taunt you when you finally manage to scratch it. But just like the best mosquito bites, there’s something very therapeutic about it. It’s almost primal, the way it feels good deep down.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I’m sorry I’m interested in you. I’m sorry I want to know you, to care about you at full capacity, to hear your genuine laugh for once. To see the softness I see in you only after sex on a regular basis. You don’t always have to be such a goddamn bully, I’m sure it’s fucking exhausting, but God knows you’d rather work yourself to death than face ANY consequences for being a complete asshat.”

You had hit a nerve, as the words settle the air like acid rain. He growls like a monster they warn you about as a child. You’re about to become a mere mouse against the frightening predator that is Murdoc Faust Niccals when anger washes onto him. You regret it sometimes.

Sometimes.

The guilt tripping strategy wasn’t always the trump card you’d use, but you felt like you’d run out of options. The ‘Cornered while the police stand outside’ type.

“I don’t owe you a fucking explanation. I’ve got you figured out, I’ve studied you like a goddamn book. You think you know me, you think you know everything. I’m the one with a mask, a liar? You think I don’t see that darker side of you peeking out behind the corner coyly, like a fucking whore? The lies I tell myself? How about the lies you tell deep at night when only God can hear you, about how you’re good, when the only thing you’re good at is analyzing me just to make yourself feel better. Truth is, sweetheart, your ego is much more prevalent than mine. At least I’m honest about it, but what I can’t stand is some pretensious fuck that acts like they don’t know any better.”

He slashed open a wound, and it ripped wide open and gushed horrifyingly in your chest. Every nerve tingled and quivered low in frequency, the searing pain burning your soul. Your lip quivered, the beginning of your own facade tumbling down like a landslide. He has a knack for that as well.

He had an impish grin plastered across his face. And then, you could almost see a glimmer of regret on his face as you began to walk away.

Almost.

Basic science in school once taught you that blue is the hottest part of the flame, and sometimes Murdoc feels like he’s so close to incinerating everything he touches, including you. It’s sublime, intoxicating, has a sweet scent like rum to mask the horror of it.

Curiosity killed the cat, you guess.

Now, you feel your mind returning back to reality, stomping to cease the memory. Like a mouse being snapped from a trap.

Sleep beckons you motherly. Sleeps wants to help you forget, even if it’s just momentarily.

You gladly welcome her embrace.

So close, so close, so… close…

The vibrations of your phone jolt you awake like cold water being doused onto your face. Your hand moves on its own to decline the call, irritation stinging you like a bee. Your eyes wrinkle shut and try to permanently lock the door to the possibility of ever opening up again. Your thumb, a blind sniper, misses the button to hang up in poor aim. Then again. And again. And again. Deja vu, much?

There! Success! Eureka! Fucking finally. The white noise of mindless television buries you in a heavy snow called sleepiness. You lips flutter open for a relieved sigh to flow out of them, and your body softens again.

Until it goes off again 3 seconds later. A deep guttural groan is released as you snatch the phone off my shitty coffee table again. Your fingers greet the metal screen again, your eyes looking away from any bright light. You answer the call.

“It’s way too fucking late to be calling, I’m trying to sleep, in case you haven’t noticed, asshole, but then again wh-“

“I’ve been unable to fucking sleep since you’ve been missing from my bed. Charming as always though, _my little lamb_.”

The jarring new pet name is perfectly sculpted, precise, yet effortless in its creation. He knew how to set off the honey that flows through your veins every time he speaks. He’s got it down to a science, he knows this like the warning label on the back of his favorite pack of cigarettes.

What’s slightly more bizarre is the first sentence only, and especially the way he said it. Usually, Murdoc talks like he spins the world absentmindedly was on the tip of his index finger. He’s always conducting a speech. Now, he can no longer block his vulnerability, something he had forgotten he possessed long ago. It’s cracking, that mask, and it reveals wounds. The white, aged scars that seemed so tight and secure.

You wonder if he senses it the same way you do, the way goosebumps sprouted across your skin.

You’re left speechless, robbed from words again. Your breath hitches just the right amount to get him to notice, but it’s still vague enough to keep him wondering. The telephone line prickles, and you know he’s going to say something before you can.

“Have you eaten today?”

Your lip quivers and so does the shattered whimper that passes between your lips. It holds up its white flag to signify defeat, succumbing to the warm water that is his voice.

Have you eaten today.

 _Fuck_ , he’s good at this. You adore and hate him for it.

A reflex, soft exhale comes out of your nose, one you silently curse yourself for doing. It’s far more striking than any bullshit response you could have given him.

“Come over?”, he whispers, his voice speckling softly to you. You can picture his somber expression. It’s cracking under pressure as yours is, with pieces dancing through your receiver. You gather the strength of returning with a coherent answer. It feels like carrying a mountain on your bare shoulders.

“I don’t want to fight. Just talk with you, okay Muddy?”, You whisper back to him, using your own special nickname that turns his face as pink as spring flowers, though he’d never tell you it does. He’s always so stubborn. Having his feet ground into the mud became a daily ritual since he discovered he even had them.

Still, the use of the pet name is not malicious in intent. It’s more like you want to kindle that soft flame that sleeps deep in his gut. A reminder of the warmth you share together.

“I would never wake you from your beauty sleep just to continue an argument.”

“You wouldn’t?” You prod teasingly at him, wanting to hear a laugh. To soak in it like a steamy bath, or letting the warmth of a fireplace after a snowy day drown all of your senses.

“Cross my heart! Have a little more faith in me, would ya?”

There’s that signature hawwhawww laugh, but what matters is that his authentic burgundy laughter managed to speckle through the cracks. It’s nauseating, but in an exciting, exhilarating way. Like going to a bar for girls night and gleefully galloping across the line of too many shots of vodka.

The momentary joy dies down quickly though, as the silence sets in as thick and heavy as gunpowder. You bite your bottom lip coyly, letting your tongue circle around the red like an exceptionally sly snake. _Fuck_ , you wish he could see that. It drives him insane and starts an explosion of arousal in between his thighs.

It’s not really what you want though, and it’s not what he wants either. Sex between you guys lately has taken its place to avoid a bitter fight, it becoming almost a religious, sanctioned practice. An unspoken agreement; an actual conversation couldn’t do much besides cause the little seeds of growing problems to sprout viciously before you both. Besides, his hands gripping you with the force of iron and his snake-like tongue cascading against the crevices of your neck was a much better solution than the latter.

“I’ll come over.” Your voice was as light as a feather when your mouth spilled the promise into the phone. Your eyes finally took notice of your surroundings and noticed your hand laying absentmindedly against your depressing pajamas that had become your new uniform. An ache coils up inside of you where your soul resides, it’s that impossible to reach mosquito bite, that yearn for him more than life itself.

There’s a bit of brisk silence before Murdoc clears his throat back to you; the sound is with purpose, on a mission. A small victory.

“See you then, love?” The response still sounds almost like a plead, his chess pieces one checkmate ahead of your own, in case it all goes wrong and you change my mind. He’s pleased with the outcome, you know he is. The actual vulnerability at the beginning was genuine, but this wasn’t. A dash of truth in there just to make sure even if you were considering not coming over, that would convince you otherwise. It’s a bit discouraging, but it’s entirely enough for your heart made of glass.

You weren’t planning on changing your mind anyways.

“I’ll be right over.” You hang up the phone without second guessing it, and the cherry in your face begins to die down as you relay all the ways this could possibly go in your head. You’ve almost transformed yourself entirely into a computer algorithm ever since childhood, always thinking of the different outcomes a situation could have had.

The one that flushed your face and makes your blood rush south in a roller coaster motion is the thought of no words between you at all. Just his hands cusping the supple flesh of your ass. You, digging your fingers into his husky green thighs on that damned silk sheet bed. Real Egyptian silk. He’s kept it after all these years.

Although that’s awfully appetizing to you, it’s rather counterproductive, and you don’t want to continue this cycle of miscommunication between the two of you. Round and round, on the worst possible version of the teacups in Disney World. It would certainly fill a void hibernating inside you. Temporarily.

The second is you say the wrong thing, or Murdoc does, it’s a 50/50 game of chance at your favorite gambling parlor called “Hell.” More fighting and unnecessary angst slithers its way into the slot machine, and would you believe your luck, a triple of “The Worst Outcome Possible!” distastefully flashes into your face. What do you get with three of the worst outcomes possible? A breakup and the blocking of all social media and contact information. Kind of hard to ignore a band you’ve listened to religiously.

The third you want the most is a real conversation. Murdoc doesn’t even have to look you in the eyes. It can be entirely in the comfort of the night, where 2 a.m magic masquerades the shapes of your faces. What matters is the intense sensation of mutual body heat, the familiar pillow of his chest where you would rest your head on as you’d talk. You opening up and making the first move. Then apologizing. Living on the prayer that he’ll do the same. You’d fall asleep with your limbs tangled together, your hand caressing his upper arm, and his kisses fluttering down the curve of your nose.

——-

Putting on winter clothes is a tedious and meticulous process for any person drunk with sleep deprivation. Borderline torture, actually. The desperate squishing of feet into boots without taking the effort to untie the laces is the worst part. You’ll make sure to add this to the already lengthy list of “Things I’ll do for the light of my life, Murdoc Niccals.”

Going outside is an entirely new form of misery, the cold wind striking your cheeks with the force of a slap. Winter in the U.K is hardly anything to scoff at; it's towers of sludge and freezing puddles that make your feet turn numb without the proper shoes for it. The exact opposite of a winter wonderland you dream of in your innocence. Your body pleads for me to go back inside, even though your brain knows your car isn’t that far away. Scratch that, your car will definitely feel like soaking in an ice box. This is why Murdoc needed to convince you more.

You had always been a dreamer about winter and what it brings, an idealistic version of fluffy white snow that looks and taste like vanilla ice cream. The frosted window panes, snowmen grinning on every street, children laughing,maybe even some igloos. Instead, it’s just sopping wet. The type of moisture that seeps into your clothes, your hat, your socks. The worst being the socks.

If only you could experience that winter wonderland right now.

The drive to the Spirit House is 35 minutes from where you live, but it feels like an hour the way your hands barely grasp the steering wheel. There’s no bustling traffic you’ve grown so accustomed to in London, even though there always seems to be a multitude of people traveling long after the sun has said her goodbyes to day. During this hour, reality hasn’t quite loaded yet. There's an eerie silence that hangs in the air in a way that can only be described as bodies held loosely like a noose. Glitches in the system are drunks stumbling on the sidewalks into pitch black alleys, or the sound of breaking glass striking the street. It feels like insects creeping down the curve of your neck, but only because the fear of silence has been conditioned into all of humanity since conception.

The Spirit House is located just outwards of London in a little secret spot you could never find on a map. A road that’s dirt brown that’s long past its prime meets you if you were to travel there. The pathway is subtle and clouded with misty fog, but a rusted copper statue of Freddie Mercury pointing proudly in the Spirit House’s direction is just enough to peak the human eye’s interest. You can’t count the number of times you’ve gotten lost.

When you finally pull to the side of the road of that crooked house, it’s oddly tranquil, silent and still as a mountain. You’re used to hearing a cocktail of screams, screams mixed with sex, drugs, or fear. Sometimes all three. There’s often an array of boldly flashing neon lights leaping out the windows like some kind of fucked up, over enthusiastic rainbow. The lights are synced to the beat of the music that plays. There’s always some sort of party being held at the Spirit House that doesn’t end until the sun makes her way back to Earth in the early hours of the morning.

“Why, would you fucking believe it? Party of the century! They’ll put this _smmmashing_ event in those history textbooks the little tikes read in school!” You can hear Murdoc chuckle gleefully in between the kisses he planted all over your already flushed pink face from the alcohol. It was that joy you’d hope to capture and put in a photograph frame for eternity, a time capsule of ecstasy.

You’ll never forget the way he grasped your hips; it wasn’t overflowing with wanton need or lustful purpose. It was a different kind of need, a divine human necessity, the type people across the globe have worshipped for centuries. He had dipped you towards the floor in a sea of chaos and bubbling excitement around you both, and had joined your lips together with a kiss.

Murdoc kissed like he had died and resurrected on the third day.

You’ve seen all you could possibly see to depict the Holy. Heaven’s depicted in paintings, drawings, books, on film, like a snow white paradise blinded with pure, celestial light. Angels bless you with their embrace, and their choir sounds glorious in nature.

It took years for you to come to the epiphany that heaven isn’t a place.

It’s a man.

It’s liberating and restricting. It’s a wet dream and a night terror. It’s the first blooming flower in spring and the last green leaf falling from grace in winter. A tame hurricane.

That’s heaven.

That’s you becoming a God.

That’s love.

So, when you step out of your safe haven of a car into the cold, damp marsh that squishes in protest underneath you boots, you try to keep that small memorial piece of heaven in your pocket. For your sake. For your sanity. For his.

The landscape around the house is colored in neatly with cool shades of lavender, grey, azure, holly green. The crooked house reminds you of the way contrasting colors work; opposite ends of the spectrum, but they harmoniously fit in well together. Ominous, peaceful, chaos hiding underneath the covers. It must be why Murdoc took a liking to it so quickly.

The taste in the air is humility; maybe that’s too much, but at least it’s hopeful.

Near the porch is a quaint garden of white daisies. They’re struggling in this weather, wilting a bit like a child who didn’t get the birthday gift they wanted. Icy blue frost coats them tenderly, and drops of water plop to the ground like slime. There was a moment in time during the past summer when they were in their prime; fully in bloom, strong and hopeful. Now, the young flowers had embraced winter despite their pleads not to.

Although they were just daisies, nothing else, it put a slight frown on your face as you begin your way up the worn stairs that groaned with each step. It signifies something about the way things are at the moment. Superstition always claws its way into your psych in moments of anxiety.

You’d hope you would get to see them bloom again with Murdoc in the spring. He’d probably detest the simple task of just watering them, but you think you could convince him. He enjoys seeing the fruits of his labor flourish in his work. That’s something.

It’s a bit unsettling to hear the worn wooden steps groan in agony under your feet, and each time you place a foot on a new stair, they protest more. A red string is being pulled in your throat, tight, tighter, until it drains all circulation and confidence out. You force yourself to swallow that feeling like that disgusting grape medicine you take with the flu. Just like the medicine, the feeling leaves an incredibly bitter aftertaste.

You press your finger to the pearl colored doorbell, and it’s chiming bell sound reverberates inside the house’s walls all the way to the porch floor. There’s a bit of scuffling on the other side of the door, a pitter-patter of noise that a squirrel could make, before you hear a hefty exhale from that distinguishably belongs to Murdoc.

The door creaks open and the sight before you makes that string tied around your throat is unraveled in an instant.

You sighed, pulling the most appealing parts of you together like a tight thread. The cloud of air that comes out of your lungs briefly masquerades Murdoc before revealing the disheveled rockstar before you.

Murdoc had certainly tried to make himself look appetizing, irresistible like ice cream on an unbearably humid day, but the quantity of smoky grey and evergreen circles under his eyes told a different tale. He’d always had dark circles permanently glued underneath those raunchy eyes, a stark distinction of character, but these ones layered and infested on his upper cheek bones like overgrown weeds.

He slouched, kind of limp like an abandoned puppet long past its prime . He had always had slightly poor posture, sure, but more than usual. Enough to catch your keen eye that currently studied your boyfriend like a book. Murdoc Niccals never flickered from the beat of his own drum. Murdoc Niccals owned the earth, no, the stars, the heavens. Your heart. He let it be known when he stood up straight and leered aggressively at anyone who dared to question that fact.

This Murdoc Niccals was frighteningly bizarre to the persona fans perceived him as. Slouching, possessed by insomnia, and a certain childlike brokenness illustrated in his black and red eyes.

It’s heartbreaking. The act of appearing unbothered and strong like around his irreverent band mates, around everyone, had taken its course on his mind first. That was easy to cover up; he had that down like the back of his palm. However, the body whispers you the truths he feverishly tries to cover up.

This had been what the fight was about to begin with. The inability to communicate, to show each other your true colors. Maybe it was selfish of you to even push, you’d thought at first, but now as you looked upon your disheveled boyfriend, it was too painful to watch him deflate like a balloon under all the pressure.

You had a feeling he’d rehearsed what he was going to say when he opened the door, yet you were greeted with silence instead as his upper lip twitched; the words dissolved right on his tongue. Stage fright, you suppose. You know the feeling. He knows it all too well. In the Niccals family, it’s like it had been bred into his bloodline. For both of you it was a cursed hereditary trait.

You know he’d wrap himself up in inflated confidence like a cocoon, shielding him from the older man who would scorn and beat the child out of him, until all that was left was hollowness and an acquired taste for revenge. It was all to prove to the world that he wasn’t another generic shell in an ocean full of them.

That desire to become his new cocoon was your own inflated confidence you somehow tricked yourself into having. That similarity between the both of you is striking to you now. Both the layers need to be removed.

You speak first.

“Come here,” you breathed as gentle as a snowflake, a flicker of a gracious smile came and went on your face. Murdoc returned the same expression. You watched the tension in his shoulders melt like chocolate, a gradual decline. There’s a bit of creaking from the porch as Cuban heels determinedly step to greet you. Then, the contact of two yearning people collide in a hug.

One aged hand wraps around your waist, the other scrunches in the back of your head. Your hair cascades around his index finger and he twirls it gently, squeezing again, cradling you like a precious lost item. Holding him now feels better than any orgasmic bliss as you drift your arms around him. His warm breath releases into your neck, a stark but comforting contrast to the winter outside, like a steamy bubble bath. The type you’d wish you could relax in forever, despite your fingers beginning to shrivel like prunes, a not so subtle reminder that things couldn’t last like this forever.

He pulls away first, as expected, but you’re rather content with it. Murdoc has never been much of a hugger; the most you two have hugged has been when you bounce playfully in his lap, his fingernails clawing down your back like a feral animal in a heavy fog of lust and power. This hug was more than satisfactory in terms of true intimacy; it was a shot of adrenaline to your optimism.

You see that familiar, wonky smirk make its way onto his face. Crooked, jagged teeth and all, it was incredibly charming despite the beauty standards that magazines had convinced you of in your childhood. That bold, audacious, unconventional attractiveness was what had drawn you to him of course, like a moth to a lantern. His eyes are already teasing you. You know the signs; he’s going to flirt. You’re not entirely averse to it; _god_ , it would feel like snorting a line of coke to hear that trademark British drawl again.

“Well, aren’t you a sight for sore eyes?” He laughs stupidly, propping himself against the porch wall, a leg criss-crossed over the other in an unapologetic, erotic manner.

A small smile shyly peaked out on your face at the amorous statement, but dissipated slowly like ice in your mouth as you remembered what this conversation was _supposed_ to be about. Despite that glorious hug, doubt acts as a predator and stalks your rational thinking. The pessimistic side of you tells you that purgatory is just Hell with hope, but the optimistic side would risk purgatory just to kiss him carelessly again.

“It’s good to see you too, Muddy.” You sigh softly, joining his wrinkled hands into your own. They’re still warm and toasty, untainted by the nightmare known as the United Kingdom’s winter. He smells so habitual it’s tantalizing. It’s that cheap aftershave he refuses to admit that’s cheap. It’s his cherished 666 Lucky Lungs cigarettes that your nose has grown an acquired taste to. There’s a whiff of vanilla as well; he cleaned up a bit for you, and _oh_ , how it makes you melt like candle wax.

He doesn’t resist the intimate gesture of holding hands, but he tenses again, debating whether or not to hastily let go, or to spare your feelings and let you let go first. You see his distinctly dark eyebrows knit together indecisively under that swoop of black hair. You can’t stand it. You make the decision for him, leaving his hands first.

You notice that his lip wobbled worriedly, like a gazelle learning to walk for the first time. Melancholic eyes brushed over your face wistfully. Goddamn it. Flirtatious chuckles and sexual eyes suits his features so much better than this blatant sadness. The urge to gently grasp his hand once more and whisper sweet nothings is worse than an alcoholic in the presence of a bar. Yearning had pressed you both underneath her boot, and held you there, while hunger for intimacy rumbled deep in your chests.

“ _Frrrrereezing_ out here, isn’t it, love? Wouldn’t want you getting a cold now, would we?” Murdoc chuckled as he slung his arm around you, moving his face close to yours. You feel his hot breath swoop down to meet your level and resist the primal urge to grab him hungrily, gravitating him close to you like magnets. To kiss with him would be to fill that sugar-coated craving that resided in your mouth, all the way down to the pool of your gut. Murdoc Faust Niccals was the kryptonite of your sweet tooth. You could blissfully overdose in the cavities he would give you. It was evident in this moment that he wouldn’t mind indulging you in this habit.

But you couldn’t. You couldn’t do that again, that meaningless fuck that turned a bitter storm into a somber drizzle of rain again.

You swiped the tip of your tongue onto your bottom lip when you realized how actually dry it was in general. _Fuck_. He took it as a promiscuous signal; that confidence of a God was back in his eyes, but he didn’t whip his tongue into your mouth, oddly enough. Instead, he offered up a cheeky wink as one of his hands slid gracefully down to your backside like a clever snake.

When he walks with you into the spirit house, he cackles in that falsely conceited way, lifting his head up high as he begins to fall into his usual grand dialogue about how _lucky_ you must be to be here again. The bottom side of your lip curls into a distinct half-frown. It’s kind of like hearing nails screeching down a chalkboard. Doesn’t he know you didn’t come here for that? For whatever type of desperate, irritating makeup sex this was, that he had in mind. You had read him wrong. Or had you not?

A scream that had hibernated in your throat was about to awaken. It was an ugly, seething scream that burned like lava when it nearly reached your tongue. The only thing that stopped it was when your brain caught up with your thoughts,that were currently racing a marathon of anger. The scream recognized the lack of noise from your older boyfriends mouth, and shriveled like a raisin back into your stomach as fear replaced it.

“ _For fucks sake, are you even listening_?!” Murdoc snapped, his fists balled up by his sides until they were as white as an iceberg. He stood hotly in front of you in the hallway, his glare brimming with hostility, like you had just kicked his new puppy. No, this was even worse, like you had smashed his prized El Diablo with the flick of your finger, an act that contained an audacious lack of remorse. His already crippled nose had crinkled up in disgust in a fashion similar to scrunching up a ball of paper. Despite that black turtleneck that hid his neck, you could still see a sharp, baby pink vein barreling out. That red string tied around your throat is back, pulling so tight it makes salty tears seep into the corners of your eyes.

“I got caught up in thought, okay? I’m sorry.” You managed to make the apology sound genuine, although your heart was stubborn like a mule with your real feelings. Truth is, it had upset you greatly to be talked to like that. You hadn’t realized your voice had cracked until the words have left your mouth. You purse your lips tightly, trying to stitch back up your own veil of security.

Murdoc’s shoulders slowly deflate back down to normal posture. His eyes met the wooden floor in what you can distinguish as quiet shame. There was a shrill disgust with himself as he confronted the reality that his rage had dominated his judgement for the billionth time. His sigh echoed through the house like a scream does in a canyon.

Although awkward silence is not an unfamiliar territory between the two of you when fighting, it never gets any less agonizing each time. Murdoc detests silence. Silence is thinking. Silence is dwelling on the moment instead of experiencing it. Silence is the absence of conversation, an art he has mastered in his 53 years of living. Silence is the ear splitting noise of an alarm clock. An alarming reminder that he is not perfect, like he hasn’t suffered enough from that alone.

“Murdoc, _talk to me._ ” You whisper tenderly, breaking that silence you know he hates. It’s an act of pity, but it isn’t meant to look down on him. You don’t like the silence either, it’s frosty and chilly like the snapping wind outside the door. You think his own name sounds foreign to him on your tongue, as his eyelids flicker in between processing reality and his own feelings.

“ _Murdoc_.” It’s almost a command this time, not as much as a plea from the last time you used his name. His fists flex and unflex in an almost graceful fashion akin to a pair of lungs. You move to step forward, but he beats you to it, taking control over whatever this situation is.

All of your defenses are down; you feel raw, naked in this moment, unable to predict what will happen next as you hear those cuban heels inch closer to you and his stoic stare never wavering. You’d be lying to yourself if you said you weren’t afraid. Not of him, but of feeling like a soldier with no camouflage. Weakness is provocative. Or is this the vulnerability you unfairly demanded from him?

You feel human, but not in a way you’ve experienced before.

Murdoc surprises you by cupping your cheeks in between his hands. His actions of physical affection are soft, but his face unwavering with lack of emotion. Always full of contradictions, he is. You can’t believe you didn’t notice earlier that there was an absence of alcohol in his scent, and quiet shame swirls in your stomach for doubting him.

“I just absolutely _hate_ the way you make me feel.” He murmurs, and appears to be taken back from the tenderness in his tone for a moment. Despite what would normally be an insult, he uses his thumb to caress gently across your cheek to your jawline. He sighs again, moving his face closer to yours until his lips lay a soft kiss in the nape of your neck. You’re shocked as you let him settle into you, let the mean words but silky tone absorb into your skin.

“It’s fucking _stupid_ how much I miss this sappy shit. I’m supposed to be untouchable. And yet, here you are.” He chuckles weakly into you again, and it’s somber with a taste of bitterness. Not at you, you realize, but how exposed you make him feel in such a sacred moment.

You can’t help but feel completely and utterly flattered, even if it’s what you wanted.

Even though you don’t have definitive proof, you’re convinced that this is fueled by the desire to hold without hurting again. To kiss without trying to fill a hollow landfill in your heart. To scream, but not at each other, with each other. It’s the type of exhilarating, joyful scream you feel the taste of boiling up inside your heart.

He holds you like a gun; timidly, but firm in grip, afraid of what will happen if he were to accidentally let go.

You feel God again. You feel him in your veins. You feel him in your bones. You feel God in the wiring of your brain. Even if it’s just momentarily, to grasp it slightly again is like tasting euphoria in tangible form. You feel yourself dissociating from everything but him, and the honey in your soul.

You smile empathetically, but not happily. Meekness sticks out in your response to his declaration about being untouchable.

“Here I am. But you’re here too.” You laugh gently, trying to be a cool breeze on the heated moment, but failing. When you feel Murdoc pull back, it’s different from the first time. It’s not a release out of obedience to more than awkward emotions.

You know it when he looks at you.

His pupils were dilated like saucers, big, looming. Inviting and terrifying at the same time, like a chaotic black hole in the midst of an otherwise peaceful galaxy. Though the night naturally brings giant pupils in eyes, the black spots are bigger in a way you’d learnt in a science class during school.

The pupils dilate when gazing at someone you love, your heart screams to your brain.

He says nothing, but it’s not an uncomfortable silence you share. Silence is the absence or nothing only words, but of everything. You hear the deepened of his breathing, his lungs being an ocean. This is simply quietness. It’s a familiar tune to you, it always music to your ears after sex. But it’s fundamentally unique to the way you’re used to hearing it. His expansive breaths are focused on you; nothing else, you.

You feel simultaneously hopeful and hopelessly love- sick. Gooey and rich, like Godiva milk chocolate.

The feeling doesn’t last long when his expression turns sorrowfully sour again.

“I’ve never said sorry before in person, really. Not once. Well, maybe once, if I spunked all over their bedsheets or inside them. You know how it is.” He jokes sheepishly, scraping the back of his neck. He looks as if he’s seen a ghost in front of him, admitting with an ounce of shame that he’s never apologized for anything.

You know Murdoc’s talents for showing remorse have never been verbally apologizing. It’s always through small little acts of kindness he pretends he never did, like writing a note, or getting you some flowers, living on a prayer that you’ll forgive and discard the memory of an argument like garbage.

“I’ve been told countless times by Russel, 2-D, and Noodle.” He pauses himself to take a deep, wistful sigh. “ _Especially_ Noodle, that the little ‘sorrys’ I say aren’t even a lick’s ounce of genuine. They weren’t, writing them is easier. Only the note I wrote to get Noodle out of trouble was ever a real apology, you could say.”

Something about him saying “you could say” rattled you; he was genuine in his apology, you know that, Noodle knows that, and yet, he’s failed to convince himself of it.

It dawns on you that he’s his own shitty salesman, failing to convince himself of his own truths.

His lips wobble like a collapsing house again, his prior demeanor crumbling from an internal earthquake. Hot, salty tears springs into your eyes as you watch him laugh despairingly, his left hand dragging down his face in a quiet storm of anger and depression. The instinct to wrap him in your arms and cradle him is practically maternal.

The tip of Murdoc’s tongue slips out of the confines of his mouth, circling around his thin lips in an uncertain, afraid manner. You feel your eyes force back those tears that still remain there, impatiently waiting to fire from them like a gun. It feels hollow. He feels it too.

“I’m sorry.” You don’t know why it surprises you to hear your voice say it first. It should be expected at this point. Your tongue had acted as its own entity, separating itself from your brain and reconnecting it to your heart. Your hands start to shake before you clasp them both into fists to remind them of who’s in control. Like a defiant teenager, they refuse to listen, continually jerking.

Murdoc looks equally as surprised. Surprise is a look on him you’ve only seen a couple of times. It’s as rare as a double rainbow for Murdoc. His polarizing eyes blink rapidly in a light switch of emotions, flickering back and forth between anger and disbelief. He steadies himself with a rough swallow.

The swallow reminds you of the feeling of sandpaper against your bruised fingertips.

Murdoc opens his mouth with gnashed, nearly rotten teeth parting, fury blazing in his eyes, before snapping it back down to a resting state. He briskly laughed again, not happily, but in unadulterated shock and confusion. His laugh sounded how straight vodka tastes; raw, unforgiving, and a broken test of strength.

Murdoc’s head shook back and forth, the same way it does not when you’ve seen him bent agonizingly over his desk past midnight, bustling away at some (eventually) scrapped song. In those never ending nights there’s always balls of discarded paper circling around him like overgrown weeds and thick poison ivy. That head shake is a crystal clear sign of Murdoc’s thought process reaching a dead end; frustration swoops in like a swarm of maggots, who then eats him alive. You try to help him before he reaches that unavoidable state, but Murdoc Niccals accepting help would be like the Devil shaking God’s hand. So, you let him sulk when he comes back to bed, because he thinks it’s what he wants, and you had been scared to challenge it before.

In those nights, you could pretend to be asleep. You can’t when he’s right in front of you.

“You know how I said you like to have everyone figured out? Well, it seems Uncle Murdy’s the exact same! I’ve got everyone figured out except you. You're an _uncrackable_ little egg!”

He says it like a compliment.

It’s flattering to be a puzzle for other people. It’s what draws them to you, slowly, curiously, wondering what’s behind your eyes and in your head. It was something you took pride in, feeding your ego as one feeds a stray dog; they know they shouldn’t, you’ll just keep coming back for more. It isn’t necessarily great for relationships though. It sinks on you, and you stand still, knowing why you said sorry. You’re drowning in quicksand. It’s best to not make it more agonizing.

Sorry for being too aloof. Sorry for avoiding these problems. Sorry for pretending you haven’t contributed to this problem, this lack of communication.

“You’re _sorry_! What _for_?! For trying to make me a better man?! I should be apologizing to _you_!” Murdoc stares at you incredulously like you’ve just clawed your way out from a mental asylum, hospital gown and all.

“I shouldn’t be trying to _make_ you anything. I shouldn’t be trying to _fix_ you. I-”, You take a deep breath, robbing your lungs of all of the oxygen left. You’re desperately attempting to steady yourself before you sob in front of him. Your eyes are these big, looming grey storm clouds on the brink of releasing rain.

You can’t stop it as a multitude of tears stain your cheeks, then your chin, then your neck. Heavy sniffles are like brinks of lightning to you. You make a strangled sound, painful noise in your throat. You can only guess it’s the smaller, more human version of you ripping past your defenses.

“I just- I just- _I just_..”, your words catch themselves and swing back into your lungs, a sick and twisted boomerang. You feel guilt when you see how terrified Murdoc looks. He clutches his upside down cross necklace in his hands, tugs at it like a safety parachute that will keep him from falling entirely. You know that he’s only acted on that quirk during a bad acid trip, when you were the only one who could comfort him.

But you also remember how cool and metallic his new one felt when you grasped it while cuddling on an Autumn afternoon; it’s enough to stifle another sob.

“I just wanted to be _there for you_ , to _know_ you, but I haven’t even let myself be honest with my own fears, my own anger, my own sadness, and I know you’d get it more than anyone. And- and I- and I guess that’s why I wanted you to do it first to make it easier for me to, b-but that’s unreasonable and unfair, and I never want to be unfair to you. I _love_ you.”

All the remaining air from your lungs is drained, sucked out of you. Empty. Lifeless. A desert. Your body and all of your instincts tell you to run, escape, get out.

You’ve told friends you’ve loved them. You’ve told your mom you loved her. You’ve casually texted “ily!!” to new friends who’ve gifted you with random, small acts of kindness. But this, this is distinctly different. Unknown. Foreign. Like Achilles dipping his heel into the River Styx. It’s natural and unnatural, it’s been programmed in everyone’s DNA to love like this, the strangest mystery of all is why _anyone_ loves like this.

You feel like you’re a participant on that show Naked and Afraid, utterly exposed. Broadcasted on television, only to the man you’ve been denying pieces of yourself from.

Murdoc’s eyes are panicked, you’re positive he’s mimicking your own. He swallows deeply and you’re hypnotized by his Adam’s Apple bobbing slowly, because _fuck_ , silently fixating on anything but what you just said would be nice.

“No one’s ever said that to me and really meant it. Not in the way _you_ just did.”

You pause in your fight or flight haze, taming those animalistic instincts telling you to sprint, and instead hear him out.

“I mean, I know. _Fucking_ hell, I’ve had birds flash me their tits and scream it. That’s not real love, just social paradox nonsense. I’ve had Noodle tell me before, happily at 10 years old, begrudgingly at 28. That’s love but, y’know- I. It’s just-.” Murdoc slaps his palm up against his now thoroughly exhausted face, unable to articulate his thoughts.

A whimper strangles itself in your throat.

“I have letters written to me everyday with garbage love confessions and marriage proposals. _Rubbish_. Bull _fucking_ shit. But you- fuck, you are genuine, and everything about you right now is genuine with me, and that makes me want to soil my _sodding_ pants.”

He’s on the verge of crying now, you watch him twist with wracked sorrow. His face is wrinkled and worn from emotion. There’s a glassy tone that fogs his mismatched eyes. He trembles softly, a 1.0 earthquake in his limbs.

“I knew you were different - no, I knew this was different when you lay on my bed, sweaty after a good shag, and we were telling each other those bad jokes. I mean, really, really, awful. It was your turn, I’d just told you one that made you tell me to fuck off, so you smiled the way- that way you always do that makes me feel like goo- and- and, told me a hilarious one.” Murdoc chokes it out, a half grin and half frown on his face, like he can’t decide how to feel now.

You giggle, small drips of laughter forcing itself out of your mouth. It felt odd to smile, unnatural, and that’s when you realized your lips had been curled down for an uncomfortably long time. You remember that day, that stupid joke you had stolen from a children’s cartoon.

He laughs quietly across from you, replaying that memory. That memory was so perfect it could be memorialized in a scrapbook.

“I couldn’t bloody get it out of you at first. Christ, you were laughing so hard. Giggling like a schoolgirl into my chest, and I know you passed that utterly _infectious_ smile to me. I saw it in your eyes. You tossed up your head eventually after I poked your side a couple of times- y-you’re _rrrather_ ticklish.”

He’s got that beautiful, cheeky grin on now, and _god_ , you can’t help but fantasize about kissing him right now, feel his hands grip your hands for everything holy, feel his accelerated heart rate thump like drums against your chest. You feel that same goofy smile appear on your own face, and you enjoy it, even though you know it probably won’t last long. That taste of Murdoc Niccals, it bubbles up inside you.

“You finally fucking toss your head up and giggle one last time before telling me it. You say- ” He cuts himself off once more, laughing with little care left- “‘My ex wife still misses me… but her aim is getting better!’”

The laughter you’ve only slightly been stifling erupts like a volcano between the both of you. It’s directed at the memory and the joke simultaneously. The laughter is booming and unapologetic in every sense, it pulses to a happier time and place than the one you’re in now. This laughter, it’s scrambled all over the place, but the good type of scrambled where they hang it up in a museum. It’s abstract art. You don’t quite understand it, but you do. Your chest begins to burn, so you stop, and so does he.

“And I _swear_ -” Murdoc pauses, composing himself, then continues- “ And I swear to _Satan_ , when we both laughed like a bumbling pair of twats, tears streaming down our faces, I took one good look at you and I knew.”

His chest is now slowing its heaving from childish laughter shared with both of you. His smile fades like a sunset, graceful in its movements as it slumps. Heat rises and fumes on your cheeks when you see those dilated eyes again.

“I knew I had fallen in love with you. And I had no fucking clue how to handle it. No one exactly taught me how to love, and - and here you are, giving it to me, opening up. I mean, shit, I’m used to opening up my arsehole, not the way I feel. And you pressed like that, and I didn’t like it, so I projected as Freud would say, and-”

You cut him off with clammy lips against your own in a brash, split second decision. It’s a choice you made to worship devoutly again, a returning follower of this religion. You’ve already named this emotion Heaven, and you know it for certain when your lips caress his. There must be another word for it in German, as there’s always a word for it in German. Something to describe this insatiable passion for him. But it doesn’t matter right now, not when he’s kissing back with the same frantic intensity. It’s almost violence, but love in itself is an act of violence in the most tender way.

You feel your legs almost collapse and fold like cards when he grips your arms, bruising you despite the love he’s trying to give you. Murdoc had never learned the concept of being gentle with someone else, he could never translate the difference between roughness and passion. You don’t care though. It feels euphoric. You soak it up like a towel, feel the warmth glow on your skin.

You know you can teach him how to kiss softly, and this time, you know he’ll let you.

Your nose tickles with his, the taste of him swallowing you whole, leaving you pleasantly full. You want to coil around him like a snake and never let go. He loves you.

He _loves_ you.

It feels like home to be loved. It feels like how a warm chocolate chip cookie tastes and melts in your mouth.

You feel like you could finally ask so many questions you want to ask, the grungy and traumatic ones that dig up old graves of old memories. Murdoc’s real humanity underneath his marble stone face has been chipped away at, even if only slightly. A Micheal Angelo piece doesn’t laugh, tremble, fall in love. He does.

Murdoc’s grip softens as your lips stop dancing. Instead, he ghosts his tongue across his bottom lip. If it weren’t for a mutual confession of love, it would have been rather coy, flirtatious.

Maybe it still is. You’ve learned with him, through him, your libido is powerful, and demands satisfaction through any means necessary. A tyrant of sex. Murdoc’s awakened that beast inside you.

You’ve also learned through him that Love has more power than lust ever could, as she manages to shush that monstrous sex drive back to a low and quiet hum.

When you pull back it's only because the oxygen you had left had been absorbed by him, soaked up like a sponge. You feel the aftertaste of him tickling from the tip of your tongue all the way down your toes. It’s savory, the flavor lasting longer than it normally would.

That’s Love again.

You’re sure you could rummage and dig through the dumpster of your soul to get your next fix of Love again whenever you’re not curled up in his embrace.

You’re barely apart, centimeters away, but it feels like ants crawling up and down your naked body to be away from him any longer. Air has yet to fully fill your lungs yet, they still recharge at a painfully slow pace, like an old iPhone.

So instead, you cup his sharp as-a-knife jaw in the palm of your supple hands, a thumb stroking across his cheek like how a painter carefully adds detail to their easel. Grey stubble pricks at your thumb like tiny thorns, but it doesn’t matter; the rose is far too beautiful to care.

“I love you, Murdoc.”

“I… I love you too.”

————-

Gratitude.

Gratitude is something you’ve felt when the best moments of your life had quietly begun to die down. You’d thank life for being gracious to you, letting you taste a drop of bliss and laughter from its faucet. Gratitude towards other people is the same, for sowing the seeds to make the moments possible.

This time, it’s no different when you wake up to the same lullaby that put you to sleep - the delicate whistle sound that leaves Murdoc’s broken nose passage every time he exhales when he sleeps. The whistle is sturdy, reliable. Like gravity, it never sways, and follows a pattern. Even when he’s no longer conscious, he’s always making some type of noise.

Although, this whistle isn’t noise; it’s a melody.

You’re so grateful to hear again.

Murdoc’s face is at peace, a mouth hung open lazily, some drool spilling out of the gaps of his gravestone shaped teeth, in the most unattractive way possible. Charcoal colored bed sheets had tangled him up in an extremely ungraceful fashion; one of his legs poked out haphazardly from the toasty covers as he lay on his stomach. That drool you noticed moments ago began to plop onto his pillow like aggressive raindrops transforming into hail.

It’s ugly - even the blind would call the sight before you ugly, because the way Murdoc acts in his sleep simply is _ugly_.

And yet, you’re grateful. You’re grateful as you wipe the almost acid like drool off his chin speckled with cystic acne. You’re grateful when he instinctively nuzzles into the warmth of your hand in his sleep. You’re grateful that he doesn’t wake up when he does this, because although you’d adore making love to him at the moment, you recognize how he’s in desperate need of sleep after insomnia suckled at his energy like a mosquito.

You’re grateful that fight was just a bump in the road. You’re grateful he’s opened up - you’ve opened up, if only slightly. A small step in the right direction.

You’re grateful that no one else has seen him like this; sure, the world has seen him crudely thrust and fuck his bass on stage, people he’s slept with were always kicked out before they could stay the night, fans have heard his sanity shatter like glass on his radio show years back, but never has anyone besides you beared witness to this glow he has when he’s asleep. You’re grateful.

You’re grateful that he loves you.

You know for certain he’s never told anyone else about his love. It’s all for you, and you’ll give it all to him.

Although Murdoc’s mauve colored curtains shield any threatening sunlight from creeping in, small pieces of gold light wisp in through the bottom stealthily like a thief. He grumbles with annoyance, trying to resist his eyelids from picking up on the brightness. A small giggle accidentally escapes you, and you silently curse yourself for making matters worse, but it’s worth it to see a radiant smile sprout on his face.

It surprises yet delights you when his hand falls into yours. Hand holding, especially when initiated by him, is rather angelic. Pure and bright. When your fingers squeeze around his, you catch a flicker of shock and some teeth now poking out in his grin. He’s still drugged with sleepiness, but the squeeze he repays you with is equally as hard as what you gave him.

Gratitude.

A groggy, raspy voice you’ve heard many times in the morning breaks the peaceful quiet between you both, his thumb tenderly stroking the veins on your wrist like he was touching gold.

“You are, by _far_ , the most delicious temptation Satan has ever gave me.”

Gratitude.

**Author's Note:**

> kudos and comments are MASSIVELY appreciated as they help me grow as a writer... and they also fill my brain with serotonin. 
> 
> update: i have a new fic out titled false icons. reading the first chapter and supporting it with just one kudo would fill my heart to the brim. thank you 🥺💞


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